Design Museum: Britain's top creatives pick their favourite exhibits to celebrate the new building

The museum's stunning new building opens on Kensington High Street today

Thursday 24 November 2016 10:31 BST

New home: The Design Museum has moved to a new building in Kensington Luke Hayes

As the Design Museum’s new home opens today on Kensington High Street, five of Britain’s top creatives pick their favourite exhibits.

Flying Pigeon bicycle

This was my immediate favourite. Apparently more than 500 million have been made in Tianjin since 1950, more than any other vehicle. The strange thing about them is that they were everywhere in China but are now very rarely seen on the streets of Beijing.

I can remember clearly my first visit in 1995: staying on the 2nd Boundary Road there, asking the hotel for a bike and going out in the early morning with the shoals of bicycles, both Flying Pigeons and other bikes . There was a wonderful sense of being part of this flock or herd of moving, silent vehicles making its way into the mania of the centre.

The design is completely classic. The one in the Design Museum has a double crossbar but there is an almost archetypal feel about this shiny black and chrome, elegantly sectioned bicycle, with its sprung seat, practical stand and simple lever brakes.

The last time I rode one with my wife we were stopped by the police who told us it was illegal to bicycle in Tiananmen Square. Now the bicycle is becoming rarer, even in Shanghai where you used to see women in patterned dresses, bonnets and detachable sleeves sitting bolt upright and gliding along Nanjing Lu — a signal site of China along with early-morning ballroom dancing and Tai Chi.

Anyway, it is a lovely object that has brought mobility to millions, justifiably seen as a piece of technology for and by the people.

Sir Antony Gormley, Sculptor

First look at Design Museum

Kinneir and Calvert’s road signage system

The road signage system designed by Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert in the late Fifties became so ubiquitous that most people never think about it having been designed by anyone because it is simply just right. Kinneir & Calvert found a way to extract maximum clarity from a minimum of means. Even if it is not always recognised, it is everyday design that really makes an impact on people.

I remember the road signage from when I was a child but it was only when I studied architecture and design that I understood its significance. The design rules the duo set up more than 50 years ago have lasted and they continue to influence graphics today.

Amanda Levete, Architect

Citymapper

In just a few years this smartphone app has become indispensable because of the way it pools data from all the various transport networks to offer a single wayfinding solution. It’s well designed and easy to use: if you want to get home all you have to do is press “Get Me Home”.

We’ve included it in the Design Museum’s collection as a piece of design that makes living in a big city such as London a little bit easier. Arguably the most impactful designs today are not objects but digital tools that streamline everyday experiences.

Justin McGuirk, Chief curator, Design Museum

Harry Beck's London Underground map

In recent years I’ve found myself using the Underground more and more. It’s such an efficient way of getting around, with wonderful faces to look at as you travel.

Every time you enter a station or wait on a platform you see Harry Beck’s Underground Tube map: an instantly recognisable piece of design that is also a perfect expression of beauty and utility. Earlier this month, at Piccadilly station, I was reminded how fortunate Londoners are to have inherited a transport system shaped by visionaries, when I attended Langlands & Bell’s tribute to Frank Pick, managing director of London Underground in the 1920s and vice-chairman of London Transport from 1933-40. It was because of Pick that Beck’s map, Edward Johnston’s typeface and the iconic Roundel found their enduring place in the visual landscape of London.

John Pawson, Architect and designer

Thonet Chair No.14

Designed in the 1850s, Michael Thonet’s classic bentwood chair is one of the world’s most successful commercial products and its design has remained virtually unchanged for 150 years. I’ve always loved the elegance of steambent furniture, and this chair started a modern movement a long time ago. The chairs became a staple in cafés around the world and I couldn’t even begin to imagine how many backsides have sat in them in my own restaurants down the years.

All the components could be created in one location and assembled elsewhere. They are extremely durable, because if you knock them over they bounce rather than break, as they’re so flexible, yet they’re terrifically elegant and very economical to make. The Thonet bentwood café chair epitomises all the principles of design, manufacture and distribution that I believe in and is also incredibly elegant and beautiful. It has been in constant production for more than 150 years so it is probably the most successful chair ever made.